It’s a joke, I’ll never attend again! Max Verstappen furious after forced retirement from Le Mans virtual race

After several months of preparation, the two-time Formula 1 champion took part in the virtual 24 Hours of Le Mans race, which was attended by Tomáš Enge, among other well-known names in motorsport. Verstappen, however, decided to withdraw from the race after technical difficulties, and subsequently hit back hard at the organisers of the event.

Verstappen raced in the Redline team’s car with the number 1 alongside Jeffrey Rietveld, Luke Browning and Diogo Pinto. He took the lead immediately after the start and held it for a long time.

However, technical problems began to affect the race. Twice red flags had to be displayed due to server problems. The organisers also had to deal with safety risks.

The race was restarted in dry conditions. The server probably couldn’t handle the rain that had fallen on the virtual track earlier.

With seven hours to go, when Verstappen’s team had a one-minute lead, the Dutchman was disconnected and lost a lap and a half before he was able to reconnect.

The same problem was repeated 90 minutes later. This time, the reigning F1 world champion decided not to continue and retired.

Verstappen’s statement

The Red Bull driver expressed his frustration during a live broadcast on Twitch. “They can’t even control their game,” Verstappen was quoted as saying by Racingnews365.

“This is the third time it’s happened to me that I’ve been thrown out during this race. It’s also the last time I’m going to participate, because what’s the point? You prepare for five months, you try to win, and they treat the race like this,” the 25-year-old driver explained his anger.

“Today we had two red flags. The rain was cancelled in the end because maybe it’s affecting too much (the servers, the flow of the game – ed.) and people are still disconnecting. And once it hit us and they don’t solve it because more people have to disconnect to solve it,” he added.

In conclusion, Verstappen called the whole event a joke and a joke. He said the organisers shouldn’t even call it an official event and it would be better if they took their car out of the race. In the end, the second car of the Redline team, which included Felipe Drugovich and Felix Rosenqvist, won the race.

Source:: Racingnews365